


an honorary winchester

by let_them_be_happy



Category: Supernatural
Genre: 12x09 spoilers, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Gen, Spoilers, but minor canon divergence, can i say spoilers enough times, no happy ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-28
Updated: 2017-02-23
Packaged: 2018-09-20 08:36:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,189
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9483086
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/let_them_be_happy/pseuds/let_them_be_happy
Summary: There was another way to get Sam and Dean out of their deal with Billie that wouldn't involve Mary's death.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> so, I watched 12x09 and I thought "huh. cas really needs some love. let's just hurt him instead" and so this was written in the space of about five minutes

“And when midnight rolled around, a Winchester would die.” 

Cas doesn’t believe it, refuses to believe it because  _ there is no way they could be that stupid _ . But they are, and what Billie’s saying is true. Sam and Dean made a blood promise to the Reaper, and there was no way they were getting out of that deal even if they wanted to. 

All three of the Winchesters are looking at each other - well, more Mary looking at her boys and her boys looking at each other - trying to memorise the faces of those around them because  _ one _ of them has to be the courageous one to say “I’ll do it.” But all Cas can think about is his horrendous failure of a hunt in Missouri with the vampire and how he was the one who let Lucifer out of the cage and his inability to remove the Mark of Cain from Dean which led to the release of the Darkness and the angels wanting his head because his Grace was used to eject them from Heaven and not being able to protect Dean in Purgatory and releasing the Leviathans onto Earth and working with Crowley behind Sam and Dean’s backs and his inability to find God and finally his inability to warn Sam and Dean from starting the Apocalypse. 

With all of his failures laid out before him, there’s only one thing Cas can think to do.Cas looks at the Winchesters - stubborn, stupid,  _ beautiful _ Winchesters - and knows that the world needs them much more than it needs him. He doesn’t know if it will work, but he hopes to his Father that it will.

Before Mary can even think to open her mouth, Cas steps forward. “I am a Winchester, though not one by blood,” he says, and four pairs of eyes turn to him. Billie watches Cas, vaguely interested, while Mary and her sons try to figure out what Cas’s play is. “Dean has called me his and Sam’s brother, so I am a Winchester.” 

Billie looks Cas up and down. “I guess that counts.” Her eyes flick to Sam and Dean. “Guess that old wise man friend of your’s was onto something when said family doesn’t end with blood.” Cas stands taller, and Billie just looks amused. 

“Cas, what’re you doing?” 

He’s not sure which one of the brothers spoke, but it doesn’t matter anyway. Cas turns to look at them, one last time, letting his angel blade drop into his hand. “This world, doomed and sad though it is,  _ needs _ you, now more than ever. You mean too much to it, to  _ me _ , to let yourselves die because of one stupid deal,” he says, and he fixes Dean with a very particular glare at that last bit. 

Dean swallows, but he still looks like he wants to object. Billie’s returned to her usual bored/amused expression, watching the proceedings with her eye focused on Cas’s angel blade. “Whenever you’re ready, Castiel.” 

Cas nods to Billie, and he looks back at his charges, only one of whom he hasn’t had to pull out of Hell, and vaguely wonders about what will happen next. “Goodbye, Mary. Goodbye, Sam.” He pauses when he looks at Dean, remembering the first time Dean saw him, all that time ago in Hell. It never occurred to him that he would consider that a simpler time. “Goodbye, Dean.” 

The angel blade slides home in his chest, and Cas doesn’t consider that he’s going back to Heaven, welcome for the first time in years. (He thinks he’s going to Purgatory, ready to run from the Leviathans all over again. 

But, to Cas, it’s worth it.)


	2. one man's heaven

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> i live to give you pain

For the first time in several years, Cas is deeply confused. True, he has been confused fairly often in his time with the Winchesters, but this defies any logical explanation. 

He’s in Heaven, and Cas isn’t sure that there hasn’t been a mistake. Yes, in the past, his Father has been known to be generous -  _ on occasion _ \- but this feels bigger than anything he’s ever granted Cas before, including bringing him back to life  _ twice _ . It’s beautiful and such an enormous sacrifice that Cas doesn’t believe he’ll ever be able to thank his Father enough.

(His body, because it is his body, has been ever since Lucifer destroyed him the first time and Jimmy Novak’s soul flew to Heaven, still lays on the bridge in the middle of Nowhere, Colorado. It lays there because none of the remaining Winchesters know what to do. Billie’s gone, she left the second her deal had been fulfilled.

But Sam, Dean, and Mary - they stare at Cas’s body and they don’t know what to do. Yes, there have been sacrifices in their name, for them, but it’s never been like this. Most of the time they hadn’t even known that the sacrifices had happened, and, yes, Cas has done things for the Winchesters before.

This is tangible, this is different. Cas vanished in a battle to be brainwashed in Heaven - only Jimmy was left behind. Lucifer destroyed Jimmy’s body - there was nothing left but some blood. Cas’s body was overtaken and destroyed by the Leviathans - nothing left but Cas’s trenchcoat. Cas took the crazy from Sam’s head - they left him behind under Meg’s protection. Dean came back from Purgatory, Cas didn’t. All of the things Cas has done, there has been little to nothing left behind.

Now there’s a body on their hands, and now Dean has to see what Cas’s dead face looks like all over again.)

But Cas is happy because he’s in Heaven and he’s  _ welcome _ for the first time since he started making enemies in Heaven when the Apocalypse was nigh. There’s more wonder in that thought then there’s been since Cas realized he was a Winchester, someone they saw fit to call brother even after all of his mistakes. 

(Dean will never forgive himself. He tries and he tries and he  _ tries _ to drink himself to an early grave, but Sam and Mary dig him out, they always dig him out. But Cas died because Dean made a stupid deal, a deal he wishes he could undo if it could only mean that he would get Cas back. If it means that Dean would die so that Cas could live.

When he dreams, he sees Billie. He’s begged her, more than once, to get his angel back. She’s says that a deal’s a deal, and to bring Cas back would be a serious breach in their deal.

Dean prays, prays to his stupid angel even though he knows there’s no use in it, a dead angel can’t hear prayers no matter how often Dean prays nor how much he wants Cas to hear it.)

Cas hears things sometimes - he thinks they’re remains of things he heard in life. They’re prayers - prayers he thinks he heard in Purgatory, when Dean missed Cas so badly he prayed nearly every minute of every day, the prayers that Cas clung to and used to keep himself alive, only for Dean. 

(Dean cries, and Cas never considers that Dean’s still praying.) 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> someone said "write another chapter" and i went "okay"

**Author's Note:**

> i hate myself for writing this. come cry with me on tumblr @sky-of-starflowers or @angeloflightclaire


End file.
